


fishing for a dead man's soul

by half_a_league



Series: crawl out head first [2]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolves, Developing Friendships, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-05
Packaged: 2019-06-22 15:21:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15584835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/half_a_league/pseuds/half_a_league
Summary: There were many things a wolf didn’t understand since a wolf came in pack-less and griefhurt from the woods and slept again in the killer-eyed man’s den. Here a wolf was better, in the trees with his ears up, escorting the killer-eyed man’s pack. Here a wolf was the hunting man’s partner. No one but the hunting man made mouth noises at him, or tried to lie next to him, or follow him room to room as he paced.





	fishing for a dead man's soul

**Author's Note:**

> Title from SUR's "Lean Back". Source Material belongs to AMC. Canon lay down and died when I wrote this, see end notes for further explanation. Work unbeta'd so all mistakes are mine. And words in bold are words that a wolf can understand.

A wolf padded across the great and wending path, pausing to scent the air or stare into the trees. Behind him walked the hunting man, sometimes making mouth noises and sometimes walking in silence.

A wolf sought deer and death and clean water. A hunting man sought milk for the littlest pup, and cans that a man could make into food, and other things a wolf didn’t understand.

There were many things a wolf didn’t understand since a wolf came in pack-less and griefhurt from the woods and slept again in the killer-eyed man’s den. Here a wolf was better, in the trees with his ears up, escorting the killer-eyed man’s pack. Here a wolf was the hunting man’s partner. No one but the hunting man made mouth noises at him, or tried to lie next to him, or follow him room to room as he paced.

Sometimes they rode in fast machines, and a wolf remembered how to brace himself on the seat and put his nose to the window. Sometimes they left on foot and walked until the hunting man was panting and tired. Now they had left the hunting man’s machine behind them, and a wolf and a man stalked forward on foot, heads down under the heat.

Manspaces came up ahead of them, scentless without people, starkly alone in the heat. A hunting man didn’t make the mouth sound. A wolf moved toward the hunting man, and walked at his left. A hunting man didn’t make the mouth sound. A wolf leaned forward, ears up. A hunting man didn’t make the mouth sound. A wolf waited, made his body tense, and moved forward only when the hunting man did, two steps ahead with his nose to the air.

They went to the first building, and a wolf left a man behind to sniff at the door, put his paws on the windows and stare through the filthy glass. Dirt smell, dust smell, sweet smell of gas, no shadows moving inside. A wolf retreated to the hunting man and licked a rock out of his paw pad.

A wolf wanted the tooth face or the good words, but didn’t wait for them. Since a wolf had come in from the woods, there had been no tooth face, no good words, no hands to scratch the itching space of his back or behind his ears.

A man made wrong mouth sounds, and a wolf yawned. “ **Come** on, Daryl,” the hunting man said. “ **Work** with me **here**. Is there nothing in **there** , or just **no** walkers?”

A wolf sat, panting. “Dude!” the hunting man said, and his voice was the bad voice. A wolf put his ears back.

“Sorry,” the hunting man said. “Sorry. Is it **okay** to **go in**?”

A wolf stood up and sprang for the door, waited beside it panting. “ **Okay** ,” the hunting man said, but a wolf knew he didn’t really mean it. A wolf waited longer.

Finally the man came and fought the door until it opened. Dry rot came billowing out, and a wolf sneezed, whole body contracting with the force. He waited, but the hunting man still didn’t make the mouth noise, so a wolf went inside.

There were four spaces inside the manspace, and a wolf traced the walls of them, tail out behind him, held still. There was a dry body on the floor, and cluttered clusters of things, food scent so faint under the dust that a wolf ignored them, and a glistening scatter of glass that a wolf floated over, coming down with a thump on the other side.

A hunting man was still outside, rifle in his hands, and a wolf went back him, and his tail moved gently, his ears pricked for the good words. But the hunting man only made more wrong mouth sounds and went inside. He smelled warm and talked like he was happy, stuffing plastic packages into his bag and scattering glass across the floor.

A wolf’s ears went back and his tail went down. He stayed outside the man space and shook himself until he felt better again, and went down the flat black path. Another, smaller manspace squatted there. A wolf went around it, kicking up loose dust, and smelled _gas-smell dust-smell metal-smell wet-rot-smell_.

Something inside the man space moved, slow and dragging over metal, and a wolf put his ears back and growled. Death was a wolf’s enemy. Death had taken a wolf’s pack, death must be made to be still and rot like it should.

There was a door into the man space, and a wolf put his paws to it, scraping, and growled low when it didn’t open. Inside death growled back, and a wolf’s fur rose. He snarled, and bit the metal on the door, and heard the hunting man shout behind him.

Man had hands to open things: metal skins on meat, doors to their strange and fast machines, cans of bullets for their rifles. A wolf barked, and licked wet strings of drool off his muzzle, and stared at the door.

“Daryl!” the hunting man said. “ **What are you doing**? **Come here**!”

A wolf put his ears back and snarled. He wanting the hunting man to open the door. He wanted the hunting man to stay away from death.

Drool strung out of his mouth and pooled on the ground. A wolf bristled, and vibrated with heavy rage. Inside the manspace the death was scratching at the door and moaning a challenge. The wood thundered, and wood-dust smell came into the air, and death hammered the wood until it chipped away.

A wolf danced back, snarled and barked. A hunting man was coming, and a wolf put himself between man and death just as the death came bursting out of the manspace, the door thrown before it.

A wolf didn’t need the mouth sounds for this, a wolf already knew what to do. Here came the death, hands out, groaning wetly, and a wolf sprung at it, caught a damp arm, snarled and bore it to the ground. The death stumbled and fell, the arm tore free at the elbow, and a wolf sprung away from it and face death again.

The hunting man was shouting the bad words, “ **No** , Daryl, **stop**! **Move out** of the way!” He came close, man smell and metal and cordite, and a wolf turned for only a moment to warn him back.

Death caught him, twisted his ruff furiously, and a wolf yelped and tried to shake itself free. It struggled, hung on with ragged bone fingertips, and a wolf bent his head, savaged the soft parts he could reach, tore and pulled himself out of its grip. A man was crying out, pup-useless, and a wolf flung itself around, snarling, caught those fingers in his fur again, and dove for the neck.

That bare, jagged stump hit a wolf’s ribs, pain burning hotly all down his side, and a wolf bore in closer, crossing dull teeth for sharp, and forced the gnashing mouth back with his own mouth to the neck. He bite, snarling, shook his head to tear the tendon, snap the bone, and dug himself in until the head broke free and rolled away.

That hand in his fur went lax, and the stump fell back onto the ground. A wolf shook the neck again, snarling a warning, _stay down and rot_ , and let it go. Panting, pained, he put his paws on the skinny chest, and stared at the snapping head, turning itself in a wet pool of its own filth.

A man was shouting still, and he came for a wolf, and a wolf tore himself away and growling furiously at a man. A man stilled, the hunting man stilled and held his hands up.

“It’s me, Daryl. Jesus, are you **okay**? Did he bite you? Daryl, did he bite you?”

A wolf sneezed, and shook himself loose and easy again. The hunting man was pale and smelled like rank fear sweat. A wolf turned his back on him, and went to the edge of the concrete pad to bite up the grass there. He could hear the hunting man’s knife when it went into the death, and the snapping, wet noises it made stopped.

A wolf smelled his sick, and stepped away from it, came back to the hunting man.

“ **Don’t** do that again,” the hunting man said, “You scared me, man.” A wolf sat at his side. There was no good words, no good smell, and a wolf sighed, and slid down until his head rested on his paws. The hunting man left him there, and went into the new manspace, the death smell airing out into the evening breeze.

“We’ll stay here for the night,” the hunting man said, and put down a bowl from his pack. A wolf drank deeply, and lay across the open door while the man made a space for himself to sleep. There was no fire, no light except the hand-light the hunting man used.

The hunting man ate his food out of the dusty plastic, and a wolf stared into the night. Here and there was movement, animal movement. The air smelled cleaner now, and fresh. A wolf closed his eyes, and slept.

* * *

_Greensmell, puppy soft. A yearling pup tumbles over his feet, yipping excitedly, eats at the rabbit he was given, tears through the soft grass. He howls, and his brother howls back, and a pup follows the noise. They greet, tails extended, then wagging as they sniff. A pup licks his brother’s muzzle and they go rolling over each other, panting and mock growling and biting too soft to hurt._

_The moon above, bright like a fire light, a man light. A brother howls at it, whole body straining to the sound, and a pup tilts his head back and howls, too, packsound packsong good and close here we are together come and_

_Something in the trees, moving fast, cutting. A brother stops singing, comes in front of the pup, growls low in his throat. A pup lets himself be pushed back, peers around the grey-fur mass._

_A man, tall and dark and bad smelling. His eye is gone, and rot pours out of it, down his face. He is an unnatural thing, a cannot-be thing, and a pup cry-whines, a brother growling so loudly the ground shakes with it._

_The man has metal in his hands, darkly gleaming, and it smells like fire and something thickly hot. Cordite. His hands raise the metal, a pup doesn’t know a rifle until too late, and aims it._

_A brother as big as a wall, solid and comforting, sometimes there and sometimes gone but likely as always to come for howling. A brother like a guard in front of him, and the rotting man shoots, and a pup is howling, a pup is screaming, redsmell all over him, brother lying and wetly panting. The man is coming, branches breaking under his shining shoes._

_A pup howls, the rotting man is coming, his brother gasps wetly and makes no more sounds. The air stinks of piss and the thick smell of shit, no one is coming, he is the only one howling, no one is coming a pup is alone and the rotting man raises his rifle takes sight down it and a pup screams_

* * *

Screaming, hoarse throated, like a dying rabbit. A wolf throws himself awake, whole body aching with tension, alone and he’s coming, the man is coming, something is moving behind him in the dark and—

The light burns his eyes, he whines, quiets with good instinct. A hunting man sits up in his nest, sweat smell and sleep smell. “Daryl?” he says. “Daryl, what’s wrong?”

A wolf is hurting, deep inside, where there is no scent-smell, no way to say it. Torn up deep inside himself, pack-gone, but not alone. A wolf is desperately _something_ , a man something, _grateful_ , that he is not alone.

The hunting man falls back when a wolf slams into him, and a wolf washes his face, trembling, stopping to pant, pushing his body close until the hunting man touches him, puts his hands in a wolf’s gore tacky fur. A hunting man doesn’t think a wolf is good, never says the good words or gives the tooth face, but he hasn’t _left_ , no cordite-and-blood smell, a hunting man is there and a wolf is lonely and deep-hurt, but not _alone_.

**Author's Note:**

> I said I wasn't gonna, and then a series of people egged me on in the worst way. thanks to my sister, to foxhatgirl, and steelcry. i hate all ya'll. /s
> 
> as for canon, this takes place between season three and four but in the alternate universe for "while the sunset sinks down below". there's been a huge time skip i might not ever fill, and hopefully the basics become clear as i write more. i'd rather not put up any spoilers because it's going to ruin the reveal later. but!!!! i will say that merle is dead, amy and sophia are still both alive, andrea has survived and is with the group, and the rest of the deaths that happened in season two and three happened, including lori. 
> 
> also: cordite hasn't been used in munitions since post ww2, but i'm keeping it because the guy who taught daryl about cordite definitely didn't know the difference. 
> 
> and as always, my pedantic ass lives [here](http://half-a-league.tumblr.com/) if you ever wanna chat about werewolves and zombies!


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